


there's fire in you

by transstevebucky



Category: The Walking Dead (TV)
Genre: Eavesdropping, Homophobic Language, Implied/Referenced Violence, Insecurity, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-27
Updated: 2018-06-27
Packaged: 2019-05-29 04:44:14
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,234
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15065390
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/transstevebucky/pseuds/transstevebucky
Summary: “I can’t be in love with him,” Paul’s voice says, low and tired.Daryl isn't a snoop. But even he can't resist that kind of temptation.





	there's fire in you

**Author's Note:**

> currently have another fic in the works but i don't know how long it'll take to post/write up properly, so have this in the meantime!
> 
>  
> 
> **i'm also dealing with the reality of being evicted within the next month, so if you happen to enjoy any of my fic/content at all it'd be great if you could take a look at my**
> 
>  
> 
> **  
> [JustGiving ](https://justgiving.com/crowdfunding/rentarrears/)  
>  **

+++

“I can’t be in love with him,” Paul’s voice says, low and tired.

Daryl isn't a snoop. But even he can't resist that kind of temptation. He pauses right outside the trailer door, cigarette caught between his teeth, feet shuffling on the only step that doesn't make a noise with anything stronger than being breathed on.

He’s spent the last four days fighting his way back from a run gone wrong; cornered by ex-Saviors, knifed in the calf, all he wants is to sit in their shitty shower and sleep, watch the blood go from rusted brown to bright red, watch the water finally run clear.

He’s managed to avoid everyone, up to this point. Found one of Maggie’s old secret entrances into Hilltop grounds that comes out behind Barrington House, then made his slow way to the trailer he and Paul share.

He knows that if Harlan saw him or, hell, even if Maggie saw him, he’d end up being stitched up and sutured, and he doesn’t know how to tell them he can do it himself and still avoid that hurt look Maggie gets, deep behind her normally light eyes.

The one that screams of pity even if she never says it outright; that sorrow that comes from loving your family, the inability to handle with seeing them hurt, even if the hurt is long since passed and rotting.

He leans in, avoids the ever-creaking step, presses his head closer to the thick metal door.

“He doesn’t,” Paul’s saying, which means Daryl’s missed some of the conversation he’s having, somehow, “he’s not even- he hasn’t ever said anything about being gay, or about men.”

There’s a scoff from inside, one he knows from his time on a farm, watching a slender-shouldered woman walk away from her maybe-boyfriend, yolk staining her clothes.

Daryl stares at the door, throat bobbing. 

There’s hope in his chest, the call of a maybe, of a desperation he’s felt ever since he moved to Hilltop more permanently.

He tries to tell it to shut the fuck up, that the likelihood of a man who calls himself _Jesus_ ever loving him is so remote it doesn’t bear thinking about. It doesn’t work. His brain is a motherfucker of epic proportions. It’s never listened to anything he’s asked of it, much less about something like this.

“He ain’t straight, Jesus,” Maggie says, and even though she’s been a mother less than five months, she’s still got that exhausted, exasperated amusement down. “Ain’t never met a man less inclined towards women in my life before him.”

“Just because he doesn’t go for women doesn’t mean he goes for men,” Paul grunts. Even through the door Daryl can feel the way he’s radiating frustration, coiled up annoyance and hopes once crushed, twice removed.

Maggie laughs. 

(She does that, now, lets herself feel joy and hope and light. The war hurt them all, but it burned something deep inside of her in particular, left her cracked around the edges, volatile. Kind, always. Strong, even more so. But more unpredictable than she’d ever been before.)

“You’ve known him less than I have,” Maggie says, like maybe this is a reminder that she’s used on her friend before, “I was with him a long while, and he was always givin’ Glenn and me shit, always acted shifty if I ever tried the opposite. I know where his eyes wander.”

The sound of a body flopping heavily onto their pincushion couch echoes off the wall under Daryl’s ear. A huff of breath Daryl’s amazed he can make out through the steel.

This conversation isn’t conducive to adding to his Reasons Why He’s Not Worth Loving list; Maggie’s tone is fond, adoring even from a distance, and she has to be talking about him, now.

No point in denying the truth.

“Yeah? Well, where’s that? Because I’ve been putting on the moves for god knows _how_ long now, and the most I’ve got is an eyeroll.”

“He lives with you,” Maggie says, and Daryl’s stomach turns and then curls up tight all at once. “That counts for more than you know.”

_He lives with you._

The truth points and laughs at him, does a merry little fart right on his feelings.

Maggie’s face comes to him in his head, gloating and full of life.

The idea of someone loving him is laughable, even after all this time, but the possibility still warms his insides like the first couple sparks off a flint striker.

There’s no taking it back, now. No chance of a _maybe_.

He’d been pushing it, denying it up until Maggie mentioned a guy _acting shifty about being forced into romance_.

Now… Now, well.

It’s a definite.

Paul Rovia might love him, at the least _likes_ him, and Daryl slips off the steps and tries not to make a noise.

The step betrays him with a ridiculously loud creak, and by the time Paul’s whipping the door open to check for an intruder, Daryl’s disappeared behind Barrington again.

+++

 _He lives with you_.

Daryl showers in the House. Manages to avoid all of the mother hens of the colony by keeping to the shadows and bringing up his old don’t-fuck-with-me face. It sits like a mask, now. Wrong and crooked. It’s been a long while since he’s had to actually employ it as a protective technique.

He watches the water turn clear as he touches over the stab wound he acquired.

The entirety of his right calf is swollen; walking on it after being stabbed didn’t help, but it isn’t infected, which he’d feared. He cleans it thoroughly anyway, steals some of the medical supplies from a cabinet in the kitchen to stitch himself up. Leaves a chicken-scratch IOU note stuck to the little tupperware box of disinfectant.

It isn’t deep. He’d known that already. 

Still. It’s better to close it up entirely than leave himself more vulnerable to sickness.

 _He lives with you_.

The pain of suturing himself is so familiar it’s almost comforting. One, two. One, two. One, two, pull. Bite the excess away, bandage it up with one of Enid’s pack of superhero bandaids.

Black Widow eyes him critically from his calf. He can’t blame her.

_That counts for more than you know._

He stares for a long time at the bruises on his knuckles, the purple blooming high on his cheekbones. Thinks briefly about going a round with one of their ancient punching bag,s before remembering the wounds he’s acquired and realising that’s stupid, even for him.

See. He’s improving on the self-care front.

 _I can’t be in love with him_.

He grits his teeth. Lets the ache settle into his jaw.

Because that’s the truth, isn’t it?

Even if Paul loves him, he shouldn’t.

Paul is peaceful. Kind. Badass and scary as fuck, at times, but compassionate above all else, even at his own expense.

Especially at his own expense.

And Daryl’s spent nearly a week fighting and _loving_ it, the change in pace from the monotony of rebuilding and staying still and resting.

He’s covered in bruises, and new and old scars, and Paul’s the kind of beautiful that poets write about.

 _That means more than you know_.

It does. But that doesn’t matter.

It doesn’t matter how he trusts Paul at his six more than maybe anyone else, barring his closest family. It doesn’t matter that he spent days sleeping at the foot of Paul’s bed just so he could feel real and okay, that Paul always covered him up in a blanket even if he said he didn’t need it.

It doesn’t matter, because Paul shouldn’t love a man like him.

+++

Paul is ridiculously _normal_ when Daryl finally bucks the fuck up and makes it into their trailer.

He’s sprawled on their couch, despite the fact he’s constantly complaining about the springs that try to lacerate him one nap at a time, hair spilling onto the floor, ankles crossed against the wall.

He’s beautiful. He’s sexy. He’s every dirty dream teenage Daryl ever hid from Merle.

He’s _tempting_.

He’s so painfully pretty that even Daryl’s strong will is tested by the even fall of his chest, the daintiness of his wrists offset by the scars over his knuckles.

Daryl tries to act like he knows nothing, like nothing is out of order.

Like Paul’s face doesn’t go from vaguely morose to absolutely _lit up_. Like that fact doesn’t make his chest clamp that bit tighter, his heart race that little bit faster.

“I didn’t think you were getting back yet,” Paul says, sounding - awed? Probably wishful thinking.

“Ran into some Saviors,” Daryl tells him, and takes his book out of his hand, carefully places it on the coffee table they built together, “got into a couple fights.”

 _A couple_ , Daryl thinks with a snort, like he isn’t black and blue from scalp to calf.

“Hm,” Paul nods, hand reaching close to Daryl’s face, tantalisingly warm and smaller than Daryl’s own, thinner fingers to match, before falling back. “You look like you got the shit beaten out of you.”

“Nothing I haven’t had before.” He leans back, pushes Paul out of the way. Tries not to let it show how much it burns to have even an inch of space between them. 

His hands ache. 

“You should come to a training session. See if we can’t whip you into shape.”

Paul’s training sessions are notorious. He regularly trains Kingdom kids on defence, attack, the basics of martial arts that Daryl never picked up.

(Carl’s getting horrifyingly gifted at it, to Rick’s eternal dismay.

A couple weeks back, he picked Rick clean off the ground and told him to behave. Daryl doesn’t think he’s ever seen Michonne laugh louder.)

Daryl’s a fighter, but his fights always end up in some kind of casualty.

Paul has the lethal grace of a panther waiting to strike. No one touches him if he’s really trying. And even if he isn’t, barely anyone gets close.

“Not sure my joints’d thank me,” Daryl says, which is probably the least sexy thing he could ever tell Paul.

Paul, who’s at least eight years younger than him, if not more. Paul, who moves like it has never been a challenge. Paul, with strong, wide shoulders, confident hands, and no twinge in his hips.

Paul rolls his eyes, mouth twitching. A half-smile. The only thing abnormal about this situation. 

Paul smiles wide. Smiles _big_. Truthful, loud, joyous. A spot of light in the middle of a pit. 

This is the smile of a man trying to hold back pain.

“You okay?” Daryl asks, which is stupid.

Paul swallows, one quick bob of his throat. And maybe if Daryl weren’t looking for it, he’d miss the way his eyes flicked to his mouth and up to his eyes again, the way his normally sea-green irises get swallowed by black. Just for a moment.

Paul never lets anyone get close. This is a weakness Daryl isn’t meant to be seeing.

“Sure,” he says, but his voice is rougher than normal, “just had a talk with Maggie today that, uh. Rattled me, I guess?”

He should leave it alone.

He’s made for fighting, made to keep moving, to swing and land on his feet, unsteady but alive.

“Heard about you bein’ maybe in love with some guy.”

Paul freezes. A caricature of everything he normally is; all sweeping gestures and a personality so big it fills a room. Now, he is a deer in headlights, watching a car come to crush him to smithereens.

“Uh,” he says, and his fist clenches, brief, “yeah. I don’t know. Not sure, if he’s. Gay. Maggie says he is, but I don’t know. I haven’t ever seen it, and-. Is this weird for you? I know you’re not, uh.”

Daryl cocks one eyebrow. It’s a move he learned from Rick.

If Rick ever saw this, he’d probably laugh his ass off.

“Gay. Hm.”

“Sure,” Paul says, voice dropping off, almost robotic, “or a homo, whatever you want to call it. I’ve heard it all. We don’t have to talk about it. It’s not even a big deal.”

Daryl hits him. Once, gently, on the hip. “Don’t use that word, asshole.”

Paul blinks at him. Blinks again. His usually wide eyes somehow get even wider, like they could swallow the ocean whole. “Oh.”

Daryl cocks his head, looks Paul up and down. Long limbs, soft hair, beard so carefully trimmed. Legs in soft sweats that he only wears when he plans on doing absolutely nothing.

There’s a water stain on the knee. There wasn’t one before Daryl left; he’s been wearing them more since he was left alone.

 _I can’t be in love with him_ no longer feels like such a cutting dig.

It wasn’t about Daryl in particular. It was about Paul, and his need for space, for holding people at arm’s length.

“So,” Daryl says, “you gonna do anything about this guy?”

“Yeah,” Paul whispers, voice choking off, and then his hands are on Daryl’s shoulders, breath hot and sweet on his face, “yeah, I think I am.”

Daryl thinks, later, mouth swollen and face buried in Paul’s small amount of chest hair, that if he had to give up fighting, this is the best kind of adrenalin rush he could ask for in replacement.

It’d be worth it. A hundred times over.

**Author's Note:**

> gaydaryl on tumblr, transrickgrimes on twitter. pls talk to me about daryl being a disastrous gay mess!! i love him.
> 
> if you happen to want a commission, shoot me an ask on tumblr or a dm on twitter and we can talk about it :>


End file.
